it feels more like molten lead
by Incendiarist
Summary: Ey was never good at faces anyway (what was the point of being good with faces when your species was telepathic, when you changed your faces like other people did their clothes?). [One-shot.]


There are two of them, ey thinks. Maybe more. They all look the same to em, they're little more than blurs of 'humanoid' right now, with salt water in eir eyes and it _burns_ and ey was never good at faces anyway (what was the point of being good with faces when your species was telepathic, when you changed your faces like other people did their clothes?).

There's one standing in front of em, face ruddy with anger as it (he? Ey can't tell, they've had training and there are walls up in their minds and ey might have been able to bypass them with skin-to-skin contact but the one whose _does_ touch em, the one whose hot breath ey can feel on the back of eir neck, has gloves on and it's not that important anyway) shouts at em in a language ey thinks is a 22nd century dialect of Spanish or Italian or one of those Latin-based languages, which seems a bit odd because ey could have sworn this planet was colonised by Americans, they ought to be speaking English, oughtn't they? Anyway. The TARDIS is still there, she's translating for em, but all ey can hear is a ringing in eir ears.

The one in front of em makes a motion with its/his hand and the one behind em grabs a fistful of hair and pulls eir head back sharply. The chair ey's chained to at the shoulders and wrists and hips and ankles is not, by any stretch of the word, designed for comfort, but the worst is where the edge of it digs in between the vertebrae; ey thinks they generally torture people who are taller than em, because to get eir head all the way back the second interrogator has to pull so hard eir hips are nearly off the seat and it feels as though eir hair is going to tear out and bring flesh with it and… okay, that might actually be the point. It seems like it takes more effort on the part of the interrogator than it could, though.

The interrogator places a cloth over eir face and ey knows it's pointless to struggle, knows the bonds don't have any give, knows it's only going to hurt em more, but ey can't help but to thrash as it/he pours water over the cloth. It's nearly boiling and ey feels like ey can't breathe and it's awful awful _awful_ and even though ey knows ey's not in any danger of asphyxiating, that's not how eir respiratory system works, it doesn't make it any easier; eir primary trachea are blocked and there's burning water in eir nose and mouth and centuries of trying to pass for human have made breathing through eir nostrils and not, say, eir fingers, second-nature and ey _can't_ and the panic that floods through em makes it hard to remember ey's got other options open to em.

After what feels like forever, the cloth is pulled off of eir face again and the interrogator lets go of eir hair. Ey slumps down as far as ey can in the chair (it's only a few centimetres, but it's better than nothing, and the almost-slack of the chains at eir hips is _fantastic_ and, wow, those are low standards, aren't they?) and lets eir head fall forward.

The interrogator—the one who talks—squats down to eir level, and its/his voice is nearly soothing, which ey takes as another example of eir awful standards for what counts as nice, because the smile it/he wears is that of something that would just as soon tear eir throat out as say a kind word, and eir voice is still nearly drowned out entirely by the ringing in eir ears but there's a definite note of condescension in it as it/he speaks. It takes em a moment to realise that the words make sense, although it's like listening through a wall for the clarity.

"You know, if you'd just tell us where you sent your little friend, we might let you get a bit of sleep tonight," the interrogator is saying, as though ey's a child. And, oh, it is English after all. "Or food! Would you like some food?"

Not if it costs Clara's life, ey doesn't. She has the files they needed, proof of the operations going on here which are in violation of so many Shadow Proclamation laws against trafficking and war crimes it's nearly laughable. Ey giggles, not for that reason. Ey's not really sure what reason. Hysterics, probably. Clara's safe on the TARDIS, ey'll get out of here sooner or later… Oh, well _there's_ an idea.

"What's so funny, mimic?" the interrogator growls, grabbing eir chin in a bruising grip to force em to look at him. Ey's fairly sure it's 'him', now that he's touching em.

"You," ey says, fairly confident this will work. "I'm not going to tell you anything, so there's no use in plying me with promises of whatever passes for amenities amongst humans. You're so _behind_ it's cute, really. Do you spear rabbits for your supper?"

He smacks em, hard, and stands. "I don't have patience for insolence, especially not from a mimic. Do what you like with it," he continues, speaking to the other interrogator. "I'll send in someone to remove the body tomorrow."

As the door slams shut with a note of finality, the other interrogator (the only interrogator, now, and not so much an interrogator at all) begins undoing eir chains; there's clotting blood on eir wrists and deep indents on eir hips which would have bruised terribly if ey'd survived long enough for them to have the chance. It/he undoes the ones at eir shoulders last, and tilts the chair forward once it/he's finished. Ey falls to the concrete without grace. The interrogator kicks em, almost perfunctorily, and while a steel-capped boot to the stomach isn't particularly pleasant, ey can't help but smile. The interrogator doesn't seem to notice, or at least doesn't say anything if it/he does, and considering its/his stoic silence up to this point, that may well be possible.

The interrogator grabs eir arm and hoists em upwards; ey's unsteady as ey's led to eir rather informal execution in what looks like nothing less than a steel trough along one wall, but tries to mask it with false bravado. "Well, this'll be my first drowning!" ey says brightly just before the interrogator bodily picks em up and drops em into the trough.

It is, of course, the source of the water they'd been using earlier in their interrogation of em, hot salt water that would be uncomfortable for a human but feels more to em like molten lead. Ey struggles, of course, but the interrogator puts a knee in the small of eir back, a hand at eir neck, another wrapped around eir wrists, and holds em below the water.

Ey thrashes helplessly for what feels like an eternity; the water seems thicker and harder to kick at. The knee digging into the bare skin of eir back, the hands holding em down are still there, but they seem further away, and eir mind is clouded and it's hard to think but panic seems now to be out of eir reach. Oh. Ey's drowning. Right.

That's nice, ey supposes. Ey's never drowned before.

Ey goes still, and doesn't feel it when the interrogator leaves, doesn't hear the door slam shut.

Xir regeneration takes nearly twenty minutes, and xir first breath is of near-boiling salt water. It takes an hour longer to calm xemself down enough to make an escape.


End file.
